The Harmonica Man

                                                       The Harmonica Man

                                                                  (C) William J. Gorgus

I woke from this dream at four in the morning I laid on my bed re-thinking the dream, so that I wouldn't forget it. I drifted off and awoke again, this time at five. I had been dreaming the second section of this dream. Like the first time I laid there re-thinking it, so I wouldn't forget. I drifted off. I awoke at six. I had been having another section of that same dream. I laid there for another hour going over the dream hoping that I would drift off and see still more of it, but that didn't happen…So here it is;

Where the story begins I ‘m standing at the base of a long hill that stretches out-ward and up-ward, as far as the eye can see, it’s desert sand and cactus, at this point. I began moved forward, seemingly without walking, up this hill, out of the desert into a lush western forest of Redwoods, Cedars, and Ponderosa Pines. Soon the forest thins and the lush carpet of green grass and moss reverted to sand once again. I wasn't at the top of this hill yet. There were no trees up ahead just golden colored fields of wheat-grass and blue sky. It was clear to me that I was heading north by the looks of how dark blue the sky was.

Just up ahead was a large, no, it was bigger than that, it was a gigantic cabin, and a barn with a corral. I walked up to this cabin. There were seats on the front porch, mostly wooden boxes. I chose one of the boxes and sat, I had been walking for quite some time and was in need of a rest.  No sooner had I gotten comfortable when a man came rushing out the front door carrying an old-fashioned suitcase under his arm, the kind that had belts around it. He looked my way as if he was expecting me and said, "Oh good, it's all yours, enjoy."  He took a few steps and seemed to vanish from sight

My curiosity was heightened and I decide to look inside. There was a large entry way and to the right was a very large room with a huge fireplace that had a very unique metal chimney that appeared to be hung from the ceiling. There were three long, dark wooden tables. One long "Parsons Bench" along the wall behind one of the tables and many chairs, of every description, scattered about the floor.

The fire pit was a raised stone area over which there were two or three iron spits, all beneath this massive chimney. It looked like a meeting hall of some kind. From the foyer one could go into another large room to the left that at one time had been a saloon, so it appeared, there was nothing in this room now, except a stairway. Now this stairway was very ornate, it lead to the second and third floors. I went up there and found a dozen or more rooms each having a bed and a pillow and a chair. Most of the rooms had a window or two, often without glass. The beds were all neatly wrapped in a single clean white sheet. There was no sign of life anywhere, thus far.

I came back down to the main floor; there was neither a bathroom nor a kitchen to be found anywhere in this place. I wandered outside to the barn. There I found in all its readiness a "Blacksmiths forge" with bellows and a large anvil with all the tools one would need. I was surprised to see a "Cooling bucket” next to the anvil full of water. I would have expected it to be empty.

Hanging on the stall door that adjoined this area was a leather apron to which was pinned a note. "I hope this is your size"? I took it off the nail, upon which it was hanging, and slipped the cord around my neck. As I started to tie it I noticed a foul smell coming from it. I was about to take it off when a man leading a horse came walking up behind me. Ah, I'm glad I found ya." As if he knew me. "She threw a shoe back a couple of miles, check the others for wear, rotate em while you’re at it". He handed me the rains and walked off to the Lodge.

I finished tying the apron to my waist and the horse to a ring outside the stall door. I cleared the ashes off the forge and heaped on some coals, and if by magic a fire appeared. I was in business. Strangely enough I could hear piano music and laughing coming from the saloon side of the Lodge. I walked tord the window and after wiping several years of dirt from it I could see a crowd of people singing and dancing and drinking at, what had been a non-existent bar just a few minutes ago.

I went back to the horse, but before I could get started working on her I heard movements further back in the barn. Upon investigating I discovered that the other stalls were occupied with horses. I returned to the horse that needed the shoe and to my surprise I went about the shoeing process as though I really knew what I was doing. Soon she was finished and I put her in a stall and headed back to the Lodge. As I approached the door one man, slightly drunk, came running out and as he passed me he wheeled around holding his nose saying, "Whew, they must have smelled you coming." I went on in, the music was gone, and the room was empty. As I walked around a bit, even over the smell of this apron I was wearing, I could smell the faint odor of liquor. I stood perfectly still for a long time hoping to hear where all those people could have gone. There was nothing but dead silence.

I had to get rid of this apron, it was more than I could stand, so I walked it backed out to the barn. Looking down the hall of the barn I noticed that all the stall doors were open, and not a horse in sight. The forge fire was ash and cold. Had this happened at all? This was beyond me.

I went back to the porch and sat on one of those wooden box’s again to think and un-wind some. Then up came another man walking a horse behind which was a mule. Over the mules back was a carcass of some kind. He tied the horse to a post and went in. In a few minutes he came out. "You will have to start the fire earlier next week, I don't know if I'll have this buck ready when they all get here."  “Who gets here, I asked him?” He made like he didn't hear me and proceeded around the back of the building to get the firewood. I followed him, in as much as I would have to know about this for next week. We stacked a big pile of wood in the "Fire Pit" and before long it was a blaze. I was concerned that it might burn down the whole place. "It hasn't burned down yet." the stranger assured me. He went about his work of preparing the deer carcass for the roasting spits. 

I sat back in the corner of the room and watched. As I sat there aimlessly looking about I noticed that I was wearing western boots, old western boots at that. I had on blue jeans and a pullover mustard color flannel shirt that had a leather lace tie at the neck. I looked like a cowboy. I called over to the fellow, "Who’s coming?" again he made like he didn't hear me. I got up and walked over to him and stood not three feet from him. He looked at me and I asked again, "Who’s coming?"  “Everybody!” As if I should have known who they were. There was no use pursuing this any further it was obvious that this was not going to be a source of conversation. I went back outside again and sat. Before long another man came riding up and dismounted then handed me the lead. I got up and walked his horse to the barn. By the time I came out of the barn there were three more horses tied to the pole. I took these to the barn as well. Then more horses and more horses. The barn was once again full.

The sun was beginning to set. Inside the big room there were now oil lamps on all the tables, and people sitting around chatting. As I entered the room a lovely young lady with long blond curls was waving me over to the bench along the wall. "I saved your spot for ya." “Oh, thank you”, I told her. She seemed to be about the only person in the room who was aware that I was there at all.  The heat from the fire was warm enough to bring out the smell of horse and cow manure on everyone’s boots. No one seemed to be disturbed by that in the least. The Lady next to me leaned over and whispered in my ear, "Little John is here again tonight." The way she rolled her eyes I could tell that that wasn't going to be a good thing. "I like your shirt, "She said. I like yours too, I replied. "I know you say that every week and I always wear the same blouse." "Well maybe it's just the way you wear it that makes it look so good."  "Wow, you never said that before. What are you getten at big boy?"  "Nothen, no nothen at all, that blouse is cotton, isn't it"?  "Well, what else would it be, silly?  "Tell me somethen; I've been having a bad day of it so far, what are we doing here anyway"?  "Why, you want to go somewhere else"?  No, no, that's not what I meant. What I mean to say is, what is all of this?”  The weekly get together, we been doin it for years now, don't you remember? Well, no, not exactly, and I'd appreciate it if you could help me remember. Ok! Now, tell me Jim honey, is there anything special that you would like me to help you remember? No, nothing special. Oh, that's too bad I was hoping there was. No just sort of guide me through this stuff, a little bit at a time.

I settled back to watch the happenings. Folks had brought potatoes and carrots and bunchs of green onions, nearly everyone had some type of bread. Then of course there were the jugs, some with water and some with hooch, these got scattered about. Volunteers on a regular basis were turning the roast. The man who brought the deer stepped up to it and cut off a chunk with his hunting knife. Taking a bite, he looks at the group, yep, it's ready. Goldilocks, beside me, nudges me in the ribs, "come on lets go cut off a piece, you got your knife"? “Oh, yeah sure.” As it turned out I really did have a knife.

There were no plates, one would just cut off a piece of meat, salt it, chew it off the knife, then stick the knife in the table top. Potatoes and the carrots were whole roasted and they were just piled on each table for grabs. Aside from the knife everyone had a tin cup, which was often filled with something of a liquid nature.

While we were eating someone had rolled in a kind of a large stool, a hassock type thing up near the fire pit that was the centerpiece of the room. This seemed to be the cue that the show was about to begin.

Everyone began dragging in their chairs or crowded in close on the bench. For some reason no one sat in front of the young lady with blonde curls and myself. A fellow who looked forty or so came and took a seat on the stool. He began by reminding us that last week he told us how happy he was to be with us as a group as opposed to that Bank Robbing group he used to belong to, “well that still holds true.” I was a bit surprised to here this public admission as the man gave the appearance of being a Don Knots type guy. Perhaps this was just a make up a story type thing. No one seemed to be too concerned about his admitted history. He claimed that he couldn't stay for the whole evening, as it wasn't safe for him to leave his cabin unattended for too long. He said that last week when he got home on Sunday morning someone had moved in to his cabin. "I asked the guy if he saw a, 'Come and take it' sign on the door? He said, no, but he didn't see a 'no trespassin' sign neither. Well I let him know that he wasn't dealing with just any Joe-blow here, he was dealing with 'Little John', in person. I thought that that would put the fear of God in him, but he never so much as blinked an eye. I guessed that he wasn't from around these parts. Then in as much as he wasn't from around here I thought that I would be neighborly and just kindly ask him and his two girl friends to get their butts out of my house. He said no again. At that point I knew that there was no more being Mr. Nice Guy here, so I popped some knuckles and flexed my shoulders a little and started right for him. Well, he grabbed me up, an’ spun me around, then picked me up by the seat of my pants and threw me out the front door, that was so nicely held open by one of his girl friends.

Well, that was that. If it hadn't been getten on to dark I would have jumped back into that ring just flalen away. Instead I walked my horse to the barn and decided to wait there until the first light of day, after all it was the Sabbath ya know."

By this time I was about to crack-up, this guy was a good stand-up comedian, or in his case, a sit-down comedian. Nobody showed any emotion what so ever, not so much as a smile. Then Mike, a really big guy, who looked like he could shoe a buffalo, stepped up. Ok, John enough of your bullshit get your ass home. John got up and walked out peacefully.

Now we got us Stevie here, Mike told the audience. He's got a "mouth organ", Harmonica, for some of you folks. He's gona try to give us some music. Stevie makes his way to the stool. He takes the Harmonica in hand and looks at it like he is getten ready for a sword fight. He press' it to his lips and out comes this wimpy little squeak, then another and another. Mike walks up to him and snatches that harmonica right out of his hand. "Where'd you get your license boy"? Stevie tries to defend his effort saying that that was Classical music and that we didn't know good music when we heard it. Well Mike was looken around the room for someone that could make that thing talk. It was a slow walk, he looked everyone in the eye, one by one. Then he came to me, and I couldn’t play a note, but I had seen a latecomer walked in and sat way in the back over there by the door. I thought  he looked like the kind of guy that could do the job, so I pointed him out to Mike. Mike turned and slowly strolled over to this dusty traveler. “Hey Poncho, You know how to make this thing talk?” The man took a slow glance up at Mike with his one good eye. He didn't say nothen, he just reach up and grabbed it right out of Mikes hand.

Then he got up with a grown and started the sally back toward the center of the room. He took one look at the stool and spit on it and shrugged a, “Humph”. He braced himself while he thumped the harmonica on his hand to knock out any of the other guys spit, then he took it for a test flight. He palmed it around maken sure that he had it just right and pressed it to his lips and ZiiiiiiiiP up the scale and then PiiiiiiZ back down again. “Hum, Key of "F", I always liked the Key of "F"  he said. A couple of more thumps to his palm and back to his lips then he found the note. Right there just a little left of center. Soft at first then stronger and stronger, it was sole full.

Everyone could feel it, like it was shaken their bones. Then it was an up and down and another up and down then back to that same note. But first he paused just before he gave it to us and he looked over the top to be sure we were all watchen, then again softly then stronger and stronger till it rattled our brains, then Zip down to the last base note.

Mike gets up applauding. "I ain't never applauded nobody before, but here's a man that knows what to do with a Harmonica, and I thank you." The man, real casual like, says, "Thanks”, then asks, “Anybody here know how to call a dance?" From the back a man named Larry jumps up, "I ken call'em if you kin play'em." The Harmonica man lets go with foot stompen rhythm and away we went. Everybody was on the floor a swinging right and left, do-ce-do en and allemande right and allemande left. It must have gone on for an hour or better. Some of the fellows knew that his lips must have been getten dry and would slip him a sip or two of the best hooch in the house from time to time. The dancers gave out long before the harmonica man did.

I thought that nothing could top that. There wasn't a soul that wasn't haven a good time. Everybody had to bed down a little after that blast of fun. But the Harmonica man, he wasn't done with us yet. He walked over to the stool and reached down and wiped off the spit he had put there earlier, with the sleeve of his shirt. He sat back in the middle with his legs crossed under him, Indian style. Then he looked up and far off for the longest time. It got real quiet. So quiet you could hear the wind outside. Then he put the monica to his lips one more time. At first I thought it was a cat cryen out, but then I heard it. It was the blues. I had heard the blues one time down in San Antoine many years ago. But they say that once you hear the blues you’ll never forget it. Mike wanted to know if this man could make that thing talk, well I hope he's listening now, cause this man is maken that thing cry like a baby. All eyes and ears were fixed on the man with the Harmonica. They were so still I wondered if they were still breathing. I could see tears runnin' down nearly every cheek of man or woman alike. At first he rattled our bones, then he danced our feet off, now he has reached out for our hearts and is wringing out our souls.

The evenin went on: I was so fixed on the music and the Harmonica man that I hadn't noticed that one by one the guest had disappeared even the lady beside me with the long blonde curls was gone. It was just the two of us now. He played on and when he reached a long sad cry a gust of wind swirled around him and swish, he too was gone. The music lingered on and will lodge in my heart forever. I will never forget that day on the mountain, not to mention the Harmonica Man.